I PS 3523 
.194 S4 
1891 
Copy 1 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



Shelf ...Iq.^. 54 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



THE SEA 



AND OTHER VERSES 



ALFRED TENNYSON LIVINGSTON. 



^ 



[FOR PRIVATE DISTRIBUTION.-] 



December. 1891. 






To Her, 

Whose sweet friendship 
And sweeter love 
Were the inspiration 
Of my first verses, 
I dedicate this volume 

Affectionately. 

A. T. 



Ct'PVRIGHT, 1892, 

Ai,FREt. Tennyson Livingstc 



POSTSCRIPT. 

My Friend: 

I had planned to have this little volume in your hands to-day. The 
responsibility for the fact that it is not there lies wholly with the pub- 
lishers. To me association is much; and as this is, of all the year, 
the day of sweet associations to all of us, I am deeply regretful that I 
have not a little part in your present pleasure. Ere long, I hope, my 
remembrance and this explanation will greet you; and I trust you will 
find in the book, in some degree, the pleasure its preparation for you 
has given me. 

These selections are chiefly from a mass of material which developed 
a few years ago during a brief period when I was left much to myself 
and my varied ruminations. Their composition was a matter solely of 
agreeable pastime, with not the remotest intention of publication, even 
in this private manner. My apology for their appearance is the kind 
and urgent expressions to this effect of the very few of my friends who 
have heard or read some of them. Having determined to respect their 
wishes, I concluded to have sufficient copies to go to other of my friends 
who have known nothing of these writings. 

As the book goes only to my friends, I feel sure that it will be 
leniently perused. Should it chance to fall under the notice of others, 
their justness will as surely modify their criticisms. 

With all good wishes, with which I fain would have greeted you 
to-day, believe me 

Your friend, 
Jamestown, N. Y., A. T. L. 

Chrittmtti, tSgi. 



CONTENTS. 



PAOE. 

The Sea , , 

Christmastide, ......... 23 

Love, ......... 29 



A View of a Life, 



35 



October, •■...... 41 

Decoration Day, ....... 47 

The Ancient Church at Tadousac, ..... 59 

The Betroth.al, . ..... 65 

Love Songs : 

A Lover's Farewell, •■...... 75 

My Love Had Gone, ....... 76 

The South-wind, Soft, ....... 77 

The Cloud and Field, •■..... 79 

For Virginia's Sake, ........ 81 

I Wonder if She Knows, 82 

An October Idyl, ........ 84 

Is it Strange that I Should Love You ? . . . . 86 

To Virginia, ........ 88 

Miscellaneous: 

To My Father, ........ 91 

"Unmanly Devotion," ....... 95 

Thanksgiving gy 

To a Young Lady, ........ 99 

A Flirtation. ........ loi 

Ideal and Real, ....... 103 

My Flowers are Fading, ...... 104 

To a F"". ' . ' . 105 

Were These, My Dead, .Alive, 108 

When Daylight Dies, . . . . . . .110 

A Prayer, . . . . . . ,,2 

Prose: 

My Native Hamlet, . . . 'IS 

My Life is a Stream, ....... 123 

Sentiment, ........ 126 



THE SEA. 



THE SEA. 



fy RE AT, restless, roaring Sea! To-day thy feeling tones 
Ut Vibrate responsive chords within my tuneful soul; 

As when a note from human throat, attuned by heart 
Harmonious, awakes the lute-string's sweeter lay. 
Yet sometimes I have wished thy \ oicc might intermit 
One little hour, or Ijul a moment, even while 
My troubled mind conceived a single thought; just that 
Thou shouldst not ever he the same unquiet sea. 
At times the heart wants peace; anon the weary head 
Would rest if all around were in repose; but to 
Such heart or head thou never givest their desire. 
Since first the Hand Omnipotent laid thee, new-born. 
In thy vast bed thou'st never slept, but day and night 
Thy big, wide-open eye has looked in Heaven's face, 
Xor blinded by the burning gaze of Sol, nor drowsed 
By Lun.i's softer light, and in the spacious \ ault 
Above thee nothing has escaped thy notice. Thou 
Hast seen the birth of suns and worlds; and, too, thou hast 
Beheld the last faint glow of stars extinguishing. 
The countless host of shining orbs that nightly pass 
In measured tread before thy sight must give thee thought. 
As they do me, of Him who grandlv marshaled them 
And, in their wonderful mannnivres, avc maintain^ 



Such harmony that each his separate, circling path 
Pursues, colliding not. And those rare heralds, whom 
Thou hast observed with brilliant dash appear and then 
As hastily depart, speed on their rambling routes 
Like one who, in a mazy dance, winds in and out 
Among the rest, escaping each. 

While thus thy gaze 
Is ever fixed, thou dost exhale thy humid breath, 
Which to the fecund Air ascends, and presently 
The vaporous Clouds are born. These, morn and eve, arrayed 
In irridescent hues, extracts from purest light, 
Are fairer pictures than a Titian may portray. 
Nor selfish thou I Upon the winds thy clouds are borne 
To thirsty lands. In pleasant rain or crystal snow 
Thy breath to Earth is given; who, in gratitude, 
Refreshed, now pours into thy veins abundant streams 
Of thy own food, which, entering the arteries 
Immense that permeate throughout thy monstrous mass, 
Becomes the nutriment to all thy utmost parts. 

To-day thy mood and mine are one. To-day thy pulse 

Is not more tense and active than my beating heart. 

Thy fretful waves more restless than my surging thoughts. 

Though boundaries are set about thee, and a watch 

Upon thy deeds, thou canst well laugh thy sentinel shores 

To scorn and spit upon them all thy mouthing foam. 

What though they hedge thy body in.' Thy thoughts are not 

Embraced by arms of land! Thy soul cannot be mured 



By rocks and sand! Thy soul and mine leap over bounds 
We cannot feel, and into space we cannot see. 
There roaming, far beyond the narrow ken of those 
Who would restrain us, we approach the throne of the 
Creator, and our thoughts, expanding wide, take in 
The universe. 

Nor can thy sentinels control 
Thy speech! The yielding sands continually hear 
Thy gentler murmurs; and as oft the rocky coast 
Discerns thy indignation in thy sterner tone; 
While to the haughty cliffs that rude command, 
"Thus far!" thou shoutest loud defiance, and thy blows 
Of wrath and thunders of thy voice make them to quake. 
Aha, my noble Sea! For this I like thy voice — 
Thou wilt not cringe and bow to stern, resistless Fate, 
But in thy dignity declare alike thy scorn 
And independence; and — so will I treat my fate. 

But thou art very kind and gentle to thy friends! 
Thou lovest man, who, separated from his kind 
By all the length and breadth of thy. majestic self. 
Must to thee look for help to reach his fellow-man. 
In his frail vessel fixed, with products of his clime 
Desired by men in other lands, he bids farewell 
To friends and home to seek for pleasure and for gain. 
To thee he trusts his life and worldly store; and thou, 
His faith perceiving, dost reward it by thy care. 
On thy soft bosom resting, thou dost bear his bark 
To destined port. 



At times emotion deep prevails 
Within thy soul, and swelling thought heaves high thy breast. 
Then pales weak man with fear, lest thou, absorbed o'ermuch, 
Forget the burden light in thy puissant arms. 
His cry is heard by thee and thou dost calm thyself; 
And now, in undulations rhythmical, thy breast 
Doth gently rise and fall, and, by its motion, lulls 
The anxious heart to peace and sweet content, as bird 
Is rocked to sleep upon the little, swaying bough. 
O gentle Sea! I know thou hast a tender heart 
And would not ruthlessly endanger or destroy 
So frail a thing as man. My noble-hearted Sea! 



Grand secrets, too, and mysteries hast thou which yet 

To man have never been revealed. The drapery 

That covers the uneven bed on which thy form 

Gigantic lies is woven of these hidden things; 

And only He who placed thee there may take thee up 

Again, and so expose to the rude public gaze 

The wonders known for ages but to thee alone. 

Till then man may but catch, in thy pellucid depths, 

Dim glimpses of the treasures rich that lie spread out 

Beneath thee; or imagine that he faintly hears. 

In thy low undertone, the voices of those souls 

Who perished when, in rage, thou didst forget all else 

Save that which angered thee; and who were doomed to lie 

Among the coral and the sponge, part of the web 

Mysterious now covering thy couch, to there 



Remain until the clarion trump of Gabriel sounds. 

'Tis true, O Sea! thou sometimes art so overwhelmed 

With rage intense against thine enemies, that, in 

The tumult of thy mighty heart, is lost the thought 

Of man; as when the children of thy blood and breath, 

Gathered in compact dark, unfilial and unjust, 

In jealousy conspire and plot against their sire. 

Riding upon the wind. Cloud joins with Cloud, and these 

With others, all denoting in their lowering frowns 

And darkening visages their evil thoughts and ill 

Designs. Beholding this, thy gentle heart is touched 

With indignation, which grows more and more profound 

As thou dost contemplate the all-rebellious host. 

Thy heart beats fast and strong; thy breath more deep and quick 

Is drawn as anger grows and agitates thy soul. 

Thy children note thy wrath. In fear and shame they call 

To aid their friend, abhorrent Night, whose help is sought 

By all who are intent on foul and violent deeds. 

Eager responding, horrid Night appears, all clothed 

In black habiliments. Around his ponderous form 

A mantle, flowing wide, obscures the canopy 

Of heaven. Emboldened by a league with such a power, 

Their coward faces hidden from their parent's view, 

Thy children now begin to cast upon their sire 

Their fiery shafts and shout malignant thunderings. 

Now art thou overcome with grief and righteous wrath! 

O mariner unfortunate! whose craft infirm 

Is tossed upon thy turbulent breast this night perverse. 



Say now thy prslyefs, O man! and make thy peace with God. 
Thou mayst not hope that thy great friend will think upon 
Thee now. By the next blow his frenzied arm will strike 
Will come thy doom — another thread be woven in 
The hidden drapery of his couch. So, fare thee well! 

The insulted parent who as yet the gathering storm 
Of strong emotion has restrained within himself, 
His breast now rising high, now falling low, as fast 
His surging thoughts in violent waves swell and recede 
Within him, raises now his hoary head, its white 
Locks flying in the rushing wind, and hurls his mad 
Anathemas against his offspring, who now throw, 
In quick succession, down upon the Sea their darts 
Intense, and drown his voice in ceaseless thunders loud. 
Now bright illumined by their flaming shafts, he spies 
Their leader, darkest, most ill-favored of them all. 
And lifting up his powerful arm, he seizes him. 
And, swiftly swinging him about, he dashes him 
Against the rock-ribbed land. 

In dire confusion thrown 
By the destruction of their chief, they fly around. 
In moving circle wide, above the wrathy Sea. 
Now and again their spiteful thunderbolts are thrown. 
But aimless, and sometimes upon themselves, and still 
In awful tones reverberating do they cry 
Against their author, who in vain extends his arms 
To grasp them. Round and round, across and back they fl\ 



In fearful panic. But for Night's grim presence it 
Appears their clamorings would cease, for they perceive 
The folly of their violent course and fain would be 
At peace with their insulted and avenging sire. 

Lo! in the east Aurora's ambient glow is seen, 

And soon her rosy figure, softly draped, appears, 

Announcing to the world that close behind her comes 

The King of Light! And now that monster, who, so late. 

Performed his silent, dark and inauspicious part 

In the foul scene, is quick to gather round his form 

His spreading robe, and swiftly to the West he flies; 

For never yet has Night been bold to-meet the gaze 

Of his arch enemy the Sun. 

Aerial path 
Ascending slow, the God of Day now greets the Sea! 

Perceiving that his friend is sore distressed and wrought 

To highest pitch of anger by that keenest hurt 

A parent may receive, a child's ingratitude. 

His ire is quick enkindled, and he throws upon 

That cruel band his hottest glances of reproof. 

Their rancor thus renewed against both Sea and Sun, 

They congregate betwixt the two and hide from each 

The other. Then, straight through their vaporous forms that King 

Projects his strongest beams and quells at once their pride. 

Subdued complete, they shed the tears of sad remorse; 

At which the Sea, his heart a little softened, bids 



Them all depart to the sick Land, their further tears 
To pour upon his thirsty lips and fevered brow. 
Then, rapid as the wind, they fly beyond the shores 
Of Ocean, weeping still their contrite, crystal spheres. 
The kindly Sun, beholding the repentant drops. 
Now smiles his benediction, and, behold! across 
The sky is stretched an arch of beauty which mankind 
Regards alike with wonder and delight. 'Tis but 
The light of love, refracted by that purest lens, 
A tear of honest sorrow for a sinful deed. 

Although above his heaving breast no sign appears 

Of conflict strong so recent waged, the Ocean still 

Is deep purturbed; but gentler beats his calming heart, 

And longer, slower draws his breath. And now, at last. 

Again composed, I hear his voice upon the shore; 

I feel his pulses softly beat; I see him look 

In Heaven's face with peaceful eye all silently. 

O Sea! So gentle and so mighty! In thy voice 

Unceasing, and thy ever-throbbing pulse, type of 

Eternity! When I have done with wandering 

Upon thy wave-washed shores, and up and down the earth 

Have traveled till I'm tired; in vain or with success 

Against my enemies contended long; and when 

The hurts, the cares and sorrows of my life are o'er. 

And, at the bidding of Almighty, I have laid 

Me down in my last sleep — committed to thy arms — 



I then would have thee place me in thy ample bed, 
Where, 'neath the rosy umbrage of a coral tree, 
Reclining on the wondrous fabric wrought for thee, 
I'd sweetly rest, awaiting the glad call to life 
Immortal in the regions of eternal peace. 
November /y, 1SS5. 



CHRIS TMAS TIDE. 



CHRISTMASTIDE. 



Now have we come to joyous Christmastide! 
A tide that waits for man one happy day 
Each year, that he may cease from care and tr 
And fix his thoughts in peace upon that theme 
Around which cluster all his better hopes. 
Down through the centuries of the dark past 
He sees the Star of the Nativity; 
Whose light has never been one hour obscured 
From the attentive eye of human heart 
That sought for sign of peace and purest love. 
Quick, on the wings of thought, borne to that spot 
He stands within the cave, beside the child 
Around whose brow have limners placed a halo 
In token of the origin divine 
Of that sweet soul now habiting the cla\'. 
'Tis but a babe — a puling infant now — 
Yet mortal compound with the Son of God! 
Before whom bow, in thankful adoration, 
The Wise of earth, who journeyed far to greet 
This wondrous Web of mortal and divine. 
Upon his mother's lap they lay their gifts 
Of gold, the sweet frankincense and the myrrh, 
Thus signifying both the royal need 
23 



Of earthly wealth in him they there beheld, 

And wafting to the soul divine within 

The fragrant odors fitting to a God. 

Man, standing there to-day, in thought, is conscious 

Of something more than to the Wise appeared 

That night in Bethlehem. In later youth 

That child taught wisdom to some other Wise, 

Who marveled that a lad should so profound 

Appear in things not compassed by their age. 

The youth became a man; and multitudes 

Beheld in humble fellow-man among them 

A power, against which kings were impotent; 

A hand, that touched old eyes that had not seen. 

And they beheld as eyes of babes new born; 

That touched the lame and now he leaped for joy. 

They heard a voice, that spoke to leper foul, 

And soft his skin became as other men's; 

A voice that spoke to dead now wrapped in grave-cloths 

And rotting in his tomb, and lo! behold! 

The bonds of grave and death were broken straight! 

In Death's habiliments the living walked. 

Much more they saw and heard to this import. 

The growing child, the man, developing. 

Has now become the offering of blood. 

Demanded by a sin-offended God. 

The innocent is slain ! like as a lamb 

Is slaughtered by the priest, in sacrifice. 

The body is not burned, but placed in tomb 

And guarded well against deceit and fraud. 



In vain the force of arms is now employed 

To keep that body in confinenaent there. 

The great stpn^; in the eiUrance rolls away; 

The man-and-Go4 wallfS foith in morning light. 

Last sc^ne of all now greets the eyes of men: 

Upon an eminence this Being stands, 

Once d^d and buried, now again alive 

By that same power he used to give to others 

New life in place of mortifying clay. 

There standing, robed in flesh as other men. 

Beheld by those who long had followed him, 

He sudden disappears in flying cloud, 

Nor ever more is seen upon the earth. 

But in the heart a gentle voice is heard 

That speaks of peace to sorely-troubled soul. 

The conscience that has pricked the tender thought 

Of one because of evil he has done 

Is but the prompting of that Soul to right, 

WljijCh pnqe in mprtal flesh w^s all constrained, 

But now unloosed, ej^panded, occupies 

The uniyerse of man ; and stands between 

The Father and the truant child, his brother; 

And chides a ^in in love and tender ruth. 

Since he, in flesh, once felt the selfsame impulse 

To wrong, and all the evil lusts of man; 

And cheers the patient heart that suffers long. 

Or labors darkly through the tedious night. 

Or waits long years for that which cometh not. 

To all he, in the soul's most deep recesses, 

Sings ever a sweet lullaby of peace. 



So joy the hearts of men at Christmastide, 
Which waits, as other tides do not, for them. 
And so they deck with holly and with bay, 
With plants that lose not soon their living green, 
The temples which in honor of his name 
They raised, in which they congregate to worship 
The soul that gives them greater peace on earth 
And peace eternal in the world to come. 

So, too, they hang about their firesides emblems 
Of that dear day on which the child was born. 
And make their homes more beautiful with flowers, 
And always give good gifts from one to other, 
And call together them whom most they love. 
And feast them with the best their purse affords. 

And though they mingle in their speech few words 
Of him whose natal day they celebrate, 
Down in the deeper currents of their thought. 
In streams of feeling which most strongly flow. 
There floats a little ark that bears the Child. 

December ao, i8S^, 



LOVE. 



LOVE. 



WITHIN a temple of the living-dead, 
A habitation for the mind diseased, 
Amid a varied throng alike distracted, 
Who once v/ere quick to softest sentiments 
And joyed in home and in the dear caresses 
Of those who loved them; who were once ambitious 
And pregnant with the dreams of life's endeavor 
And its success; and buoyed with hope as any 
Who then, without those walls, were free and healthful 
And eagerly pursuing wealth or pleasure — 
Amid that mass of mental wreck and ruin 
There sat a inaid of tender years, demented. 
All day she sat there in the selfsame spot. 
With eyes half closed and bent upon the Hoor, 
Her greasy, puffy face imlined by thought. 
Her cold, congested hands in awkward pose 
Upon her lap or hanging motionless 
Beside her chair, her lips tight sealed in silence. 
Nor opened save to take of food or drink 
When offered by the nurse; a breathing statue. 
Unmoved as marble by the life around her. 
She breathed and ate and slept and woke again; 
A beast doqs this, and more, but she was human. 



Thus yesterday and so to-day and daily 
I saw her thus, while, like a panorama, 
Befoie the eyes of God there stately passed 
The various scenes that marked a mundane 



At last the quiet pool begins to stir; 

The healing waters now with life are troubleii ; 

The sickened soul is laving in its depths. 

The maid arose and walked with open eyes; 

Her lips again were parted in sweet speech, 

The quickened thoughts now played about her face, 

Her eyes expressed her wonted animation. 

The ruddy currents flowed in liealthful motion, 

And as the widow's son threw off the pall 

And upright sat before the wondering mother. 

So stood the maid in my astonished sight. 



I carefully avoided hasty converse 

And chid her nurses to a like discretion ; 

But when some days had passed and still I noticetl 

A calm demeanor with this wondrous change 

I ventured to address her with the question 

Which oft my mind conceived through her long trance. 

And so I said : " My dear, I want to ask you 

What you were thinking all those many months 

While by the door you sat in utter silence?" 

To my surprise the maiden blushed and sighed. 



And hesitated, but when I again 

Renewed my query, saying, " Tell me, Mary, 

Of what or whom you thought?" the modest maid. 

Her eyes upon the floor and hands, uneasy, 

Engaged in bashful plucking at her apron. 

Replied: "I think — I think — sir — it was Robbie." 



So, Mary, thy long day-dream was of love! 
Of loving Robbie, whom thou lovest most! 
He was thy god and thou his worshiper. 
Love was thy sun; thou knew no other light, 
And by that light thine eye beheld but one; 
He was the earth, thy single thought the moon. 



O Love! Thou last emotion to depart 

From mortals sick in body and in mind! 

Thou smouldering ember which alone keeps warr 

The heart when every sense is numb and frigid! 

And in the hour of death thou latest friend 

To bid adieu to the insensate tissue 

Within the cavern where thou madst thy home; 

And last to linger on the chilling lips! 



Thou sweetest sentiment of man or God! 
Thou dearest thing in all the universe! 
Thou sponge that wipes out every tale of 



Thou only cord by whicli t1i6 Sb'i'i\ is Kft^A 
From earth fo the eternal jbartidise! 
Thou center round which all thhig's else devolve! 
Thou never-dying, fiverlasting Love! 

February ig, iSS6. 



A VIEIV OF A LIFE. 



A VIEW OF A LIFE. 



I have a heart to love; 
l?ut, one by one, the objects, passing sweet, 
On whom my love was fixed, slipped from the bounds 
That hedge mortality. Or now above, 
Around, or where I cannot surely tell; 
I only know they are beyond mv confines. 
In dreams I have reached out my eager arms 
To clasp the fairest vision that my eyes 
E'er looked upon; but when, in trembling joy, 
I would have grasped m.y love and to my bosom 
Have pressed her precious form, she slow receded. 
And still receded, till, in air dissolving. 
Her sweet face faded into nothingness; 
And I, in agony of loneliness. 
Awoke, remembering she was beyond 
My mortal reach. 

My heart, so rudely pruned 
By heedless fate, yet full of vital force. 
Throws out each day, by natural growth impelled. 
Its little tendrils, which find naught to cling to. 
The vine that would, by complementing help, 
Aspire to light and lofty elevation 



Lies, therefore, humbly on the earth, supine, 
And is contented most when Autumn's leaves 
Upon it kindly fall and hide its dearth. 

And I have ardent lips. 
Which, knowing once the nameless ecstacy 
Of meeting other lips, in softest touch. 
Prolonged, while pure and spicy breath perfumed 
The air inhaled, and circling arms firm pressed 
Together hearts that beat in unison, 
Cannot forget their loss. 

I had ambition once 
To be a more than mere existing thing; 
In honor and by work to have my place- 
In foremost ranks of acting, thinking men; 
To find, each morn, some noble work to do. 
To see, each eve, my duty well performed ; 
Loving my fellow-man, to do him good; 
To be a husband, master of a home. 
Whose mistress true loved me unspeakably ; 
To be a father, happy sire of children. 
Who, as from year to year their tender natures 
Put forth new shoots of beauty, grow in strength. 
And burst in fragrant bloom that promises 
A fruitful time, are constantly a joy; 
Until in later ye.nrs, to manhood grown. 
One takes my name and place in active life; 



Another, in fair womanhood, obeying 

Her nature, leaves parental care and goes 

To grace with beauty and all gentle charms 

Her lover's home; while I and she who shares 

With me life's woes and joys, alone at last, 

In pleasing idleness of feeble age, 

Feel sacred satisfaction as we see 

The dear first-fruits of those young, thrifty plants 

To whom we gave existence and a name, 

And watch the new lives sweetly grow apace 

And bud and bloom and flourish, while we wait 

The termination of our own. . . . This was 

A dream — ambition's empty recompense. 



I have a life to live 
Which is not all delusive as a dream; 
And yet I find no joy enticing me 
To still prolong this weary, mortal round. 
One constant thought — would that it were His wil 
Who in this pulsing mass breathed his pure soul, 
To take that spirit from this jaded flesh. 
Defiled by contact with the grime and soot 
Of human wretchedness and sinful lust, 
And in some other sphere, some other form. 
Permit the full fruition of its hopes! 
This goal awaiting I will labor on 
Until my lonely, dreary course be run. 



Perhaps in some fair clime 
The heart that here is bowed with griefs and woes 
And rudely tossed in tempests of this life, 
Or bruised and faint from knocks of human strife, 
Or buried quite beneath the heavy cares 
And infinite perplexities of earth, 
Yet brave and calml}' meeting it'^ hard fate, 
Will, in a richer measure, find reward 
And in a grander strength employ those traits 
Which, born in sorrow, to perfection grew 
While daily fed on rough experience. 

October JO, /SSj. 



OCTOBER. 



OCTOBER. 



THE gorgeous hues around me vie 
With colors of the evening sky. 
No eastern maiden in her best 
Is all so gay and richly dressed 
As our dear Earth, in red and green, 
Yellow and brown, and, in between. 
All shades and tints. A fairy hand 
Touched verdure with mosaic wand. 



Low in the West the sleepy Sun, 
His shining day of duty done, 
Rests, purple-robed, beyond the lea; 
A moment glances o'er the mead, 
Then folds his wings, so long outspread. 
And gently sinks upon the sea. 

Now Luna, while hei- father sleeps, 
While lonely watcher vigil keeps. 
Brightly reflects, with modest grace, 
The glory got from her sire's face; 
And chilly air and falling leaf, 
The ripened corn in tented sheaf, 



And barren fields o'er all the land 
Tell that October is at hand. 



O fairest month! If but thy hues 

Might ne'er their glorious beauty lose! 

If but thy air, so pure and clear, 

Gave strength and hope throughout the year! 

But no! one word alone I see 

Upon each blade and flower and tree — 

Change! This the message thou dost bear 

To my regretful, listening ear. 

Thy hues must fade; thy leaves must fall, 

And desolation cover all. 

Even thy stimulating breath 

Must icy cold grow in thy death. 

After, a pall of purest white 

Shall hide thy form from mortal sight; 

An infant's pall. A little span 

Of beauteous life (in time less than 

A single year) departs in thine, 

Called back unto its source divine. 

And this is life: To-day a joy 
So pure it seems naught can alloy. 
To-morrow, early, it has fled; 
A sorrow find we in its stead. 



Thus, lonely, sit I here and brood. 

Wrapped in thy melancholy mood. 

Regretting that I must again 

Be roused from the delicious pain 

Of these sad thoughts to hear once more 

The busy city's ceaseless roar. 

And, midst the throng and tumult rife. 

Engage again in human strife. 

On train front Atlantic City, 
October ig, iSSj. 



DECORATION DAY. 



T 



DECORATION DAY/ 

HE living and the loving stand to-day 
Around the habitations of the dead! 



Not newly dead are these who lowly lie 

In quiet, single-chambered homes, asleep 

For aye to voice of friend or to earth's din, 

Beneath the feet of them who kindly come 

To thatch their humble dwellings' roofs with flowers. 

These earthy, uncemented walls closed round 

Their unresisting occupants when men 

Who now stand here with bearded lips were babes 

Unborn and leaped within their mothers' wombs 

At shouts of victory, and quivered there 

At tales of strifes in which their sires were slain. 

Nor to their mouldy tombs come men to-day 

In sorrow's crape and black habiliments, 

With swollen, blood-shot eyes and tear-stained cheeks, 

Which mark the visage of the freshly grieved. 

There was a time to weep and sob and mourn, 

And put on garments of a somber hue, 

When living eyes saw w^ounds in these dead forms, 

♦These verses were written while, in imagination, upon the field of Gettysburg, where 
many, both of the "Blue" and the "Gray," are lying. 



Rude, cruel, foul-made, gaping wounds, through which 

The ruddy waves had ebbed their latest tide 

While battle-smoke made dark the fading day 

And war's loud tumult drowned the last faint cry; 

While one great nation wept and sobbed and mourned 

With mothers, wives and sisters of these dead ; 

While frantic War raged up and down the land, 

Led by the horrors. Hate and Jealousy 

And Anger and Revenge; and followed fast 

By all the fellows of their reckless ti'ain, 

Pain, Sickness, Death and Woe and ruthless Ruin, 

And all the Crimes, and all the vicious Passions, 

And Fire aiul Waste and Want and Poverty; 

And, over all, black, wide-winged Desolatioai, 

Dark hovering, shutting heaven's light away. 



Now those dark, dismal days are but remembered 

As one recalls the tragedies of dreams; 

And gentle Peace now hovers o'er the land. 

And, with her spotless pinions, fans the brow 

Of Industry and swells the bellied sails 

Of Commerce; and, held in her beak, she bears 

The olive branch, and in her talons grasps 

A vine's rich cluster and the corn's ripe ear, 

Plucked from the fruitful fields of Agriculture. 

Prosperity has driven Want away 

And Plenty fills the garners of the farm, 

And Comfort houses everv son of toil, 



And Joy smiles in the sweaty face of Labor, 

And Hope points cheeringly to future years. 

Now babes lie tranquil in their mothers' wombs, 

And wives are glad, for husbands come at eve; 

And maids rejoice, for lovers soon return. 

Fire glows now only in the busy forge 

That melts the cannon into plows and tools, 

Or from the earth dissolves her precious metals, 

Which, by the pliant hand of Art, are molded 

To useful shapes and to the world's advantage. 

Sweet Charity has joined the hearts and hands 

Of men who once raised swords against each other; 

And Love grows beauteous flowers in every garden 

Of all the country's hillsides, plains and valleys, 

And on this happy May day gathers them 

And brings them to the heroes of the land 

As her best offering of gratitude 

To those who cannot hear the praises spoken, 

Nor see the grateful look upon men's faces. 

Nor feel the silent pressure of the hand. 

From these turf-censers, sprinkled with fresh flowers. 

While summer's suns are scorching their sweet petals, 

A fragrant incense will arise to heaven 

And bear to the brave spirits of these heroes 

The grateful sentiments of human hearts. 

Thus shall men honor most the noble dead 
Who, for their country's weal, accepted woe; 



Who bore the mutilation of their bodies 

That its great body might continue whole, 

And gave their lives that its life might not perish, 

And thus bought blessings for their fellow-men. 

The marble and the granite and the brass 

Are cold and hard and senseless, dead reminders 

Of lively virtues and warm sentiments 

And soft emotions of the human breast; 

And their stiff, calculated, chiseled words 

Stand there through generations, formal, fixed, 

As the full measure of an obligation; 

The monument, a duty justly done; 

And these enduring marks of estimation 

Are granted only to a favored few 

Who were, perhaps, less brave and suffered less 

Than many who lie nameless in their graves. 

But flowers are Love's sweet thoughts that bloom, like love. 

Most richly and profusely in the spring-time, 

And burst spontaneous as love itself 

Springs from one heart to greet another heart. 

Each new day they are fresh and always welcome; 

And they are varied as affection's speech: 

A stately lily, pure as its white petals; 

A red rose, warm and blushing with its passion; 

A modest daisy, from neglected field; 

The sweet azalea, from the wooded hill; 

A buttercup, rich as its golden color; 

And wee, dear violets. Love's constant mentors, 

That only Winter's blustering blasts may silence. 



Each several flower has its own pretty speech, 
Its silent speech, looking the thought it feels; 
And flowers are soft and tender as the thoughts. 
The living, loving thoughts they represent; 
And they are beautiful to look upon, 
Nor do they cause a shudder through the frame. 
For they suggest not death, but beauteous life; 
Not the dark charnel house and damp, chill dust 
That once was quickened with a living soul. 
But that dear soul itself which now inhabits 
Immortal regions, where eternal bloom 
The everlasting flowers of Paradise. 



So stand, to-day, the living round the dead, 
Thatching their humble dwellings' roofs with flowers 
And sprinkling on these censers Love's sweet thoughts. 
Which Summer's suns will burn in fragrant incense 
That will arise to heaven to the heroes 
Whose bodies moulder in these lowly tombs. 
And so the living ever more will gather 
About these sleeping forms in pleasant springtime, 
Strewing their loving thoughts in beauteous flowers; 
Remembering the woe these dead accepted, 
That to their country might come blessed weal, 
And that the mutilation of their bodies 
Kept whole the land now honored and majestic; 
And that the present reign of peace and concord 
Was bought by blood that poured forth from their woui 
51 



But there are other dead who perished then 

Now lying there as peacefully asleep. 

They were as brave to face the cannon's mouth; 

They walked as boldly in the jaws of death; 

From their rude wounds their blood as freely flowed; 

As manfully they laid them down and died; 

And they were martyrs, though their cause was evil. 

Their cause was wrong, but they believed it right, 

And gauged their faith by no less than their lives. 

We do not sing to them our songs of praise; 

Our faces are not toward them grateful turned; 

To them we owe no blessings of to-day ; 

But while we handle these sweet signs of love, 

Of warm emotions and of tender thoughts, 

Shall we not strew some on their graves as well? 

They were the kindred of these nobler dead 

In soldiers' virtues and in soldiers' woes. 

Like them, they left their homes and wives and sweethearts 

To trudge in measured step with gun and knapsack. 

Through the lone night they paced with watchful eyes 

And beating hearts, while their worn fellows slept; 

They heard the bugle and the battle-shout. 

Obeyed their captain's call and felt as keen 

The bullet, bayonet and saber-stroke; 

And who shall say that, when their spirits winged 

Their flight beyond the ken of mortal eye. 

They went not hand in hand, fraternal joined. 

With them who in the flesh had been their foes? 

Or who shall say what these dumb mouths would speak 



Could they, as erst, the heart's deep feelings utter? 
What keen regret, sincere and honest sorrow, 
What earnest wish to right their deeds of wrong 
May not those souls have felt when from their sight 
The mortal veil was lifted and they saw 
Truth, Justice, Freedom, Right, ranked with their foes. 
Ranked with the country which they would have rent, 
Ranked with the millions whom they would have kept 
In bondage, ignorance and brutal fear! 
Shall then our hearts deny to them forgiveness 
And Charity reach not to them her hand. 
To show that Hate was buried with their dust 
And strife put in the scabbard with our swords? 
Then strew upon their turf-rCofs pretty flowers. 
Whose fragrance will to heaven bear oi;r thoughts, 
And tell the welcome tale to former foes 
That Hate was buried deeper than their bones; 
That wars are done and strifes are sheathed with swords; 
That Charity has taken by the hand 

Both " Blue" and " Gray" and made them once more brothers; 
That Love plucks flowers from forest, field and garden 
To deck the graves of former friend and foe; 
That North and South and East and West clasp hands 
And dance around the pole of Liberty, 
From which the Stars and Stripes are proudly streaming. 
While all the land sing songs of Peace and Freedom, 
And nations look with wonder on the scene 
Of universal concord in that country 
Where all the people rule themselves discreetly; 
83 



Where men are truly, now, born free and equal; 
Where neither race nor riches, caste nor color, 
Determines in the babe more lofty station 
Nor wider scope to live, enjoy sweet freedom 
Or keen pursue the longed-for happiness; 
For blackest Ethiop is free as Saxon! 



.Still other graves there are, more newly made, 

On some of which the grass has not yet grown; 

And one stands open at this very hour 

To coldly welcome him who, yesterday. 

Wrapped round his chilling limbs his blanket robe, 

Lay down and closed his eyes and fell asleep. 

These new-made dwellings of the noble dead 

Contain the forms of soldier veterans 

Who perished not on bloody battle-fields. 

But brought their wounds and sickened bodies home. 

Or from the conflict 'scaped without a scar. 

But they as wholly offered to their country 

The priceless, patriotic gift of life 

As those from whom that best gift was accepted. 

For, side by side with them they stood in battle. 

Marched in the rain or snow or burning sunshine, 

Paced up and down the lonely beat on picket, 

Made the cold earth their cot, the sky their tent-roof; 

And some left arms and legs on Southern fields, 

And some brought bullets home fixed in their flesh, 

And some bore scars of bayonets and sabers. 



And soon or later these laid down the lives 
Which they had offered for their country's weal. 
So on their graves Love lays the same dear flowers 
With which she decorates the noble dead 
From whose rude wounds, upon the battle-field, 
The ruddy waves flowed out their latest tide. 



And there are heroes yet alive and standing 

About these graves to-day with quickened thoughts, 

Reviewing hours when, with these dead, they fought 

And bled and met the rough assaults of war, 

And gathered round the camp-fire telling tales 

Of home, of peace and love, and in the tents 

Lay wearily and dreamt the night away. 

And while the noble dead are decked with flowers 

We fain would give a nosegay to the living. 

Take then this rose — our grateful heart's affection — 

And this green leaf — our lasting memory 

Of thy brave deeds for us and for our country; 

And wear them on thy manly soldier bosom 

Until thy limbs grow chill and thou dost wrap 

Thy blanket robe around them and lie down 

And close thine eyes and fall asleep in death. 

Then shalt thou bear upon thy soul's brave breast 

While winging far thy first immortal flight 

The love and memory of human hearts — 

A decoration nobler than proud kings 

May lay upon their titled favorites. 



And when thy form lies also in the tomb, 

In single-chambered home beneath the sod, 

Like these thy mates who perished long ago. 

Then men will gather in the pleasant spring-time 

To strew with Love's sweet flowers the nation's dead 

In memory of their virtues and their woes, 

And of the blessings which they bought for others 

When for their country's weal they nobly offered 

Their lives and all that mortals hold most dear. 

Thus, too, from generations yet unborn 

Will spring a people's ever grateful speech. 

Not in the calculated, chiseled words 

On the cold monuments of stone and brass. 

But from these soldiers' humble dwellings' roofs, 

Thatched with the posies of sweet, blooming May, 

Which summers' suns of future years will burn, 

A fragrant incense will arise to heaven 

And bear to the brave spirits of our heroes 

The nation's love and memory undying. 

April 24, iSS6, 



THE CHURCH AT TADOUSAC. 



THE CHURCH AT TADOUSAC. 

From " Katrine and Arthur." 

B RRIVED at Tadousac, as is the custom 
M The travelers, debarking, crossed the town 
To see the ancient church. Upon a height, 

From which St. Lawrence and the Saguenay 

Are both in view, it stands, as it has stood 

For nearly thrice a century, 'tis said ; 

The second temple in America 

Erected to the honor of Almighty. 



So small, yet dignified; in just proportion 
Of steeple, choir, of nave and gallery ; 
The high-backed pews, that hide the worshipers; 
The Host, amid the candles on the altar; 
The walls, adorned with paintings, dim and cracked 
With age; the crucifix, which generations 
Have bowed before, their hearts to heaven raised. 
Meanwhile, by its dumb likeness of the Savior, 
Whose tender love, whose suffering and death 
Had hither drawn those humble souls, devout; 
There, in that little, consecrated house, 
The small beginning of a vast increase 
59 



Of sacred architecture, Arthur sat 
And prayed for blessings on the beauteous maiden 
Whose heart (he knew not) had ah'eady yielded 
Itself to him; and prayed that, somehow, He 
Would bring their lonely lives in happy union 
And make their future sweet as was his dream. 



When from the little, holy house he came, 

He stood a moment on the sacred ground 

Strewn thick with soft suggestions of the past. 

Behind the church, saw mounds of buried hopes 

Marked by a stone engraven with a name; 

There have Love's fires been banked for Time's long night, 

Whose smoth'ring coals will, in eternity, 

Be blown to living, never-dying blaze 

By breath of Him who lighted first the fires. 



There, centuries ago, have pain and sorrow 

Bid last farewell to sad and suff'ring mortals. 

There, wrapped in clay, lie dusty forms of men 

Whose strength has wielded axe whose blows resounded 

Across these rivers, flowing then as now. 

The face of mortal beauty there was veiled 

By priest, for separation long as time 

From those who erst had loved to look upon it; 

And there her lips were sealed in endless silence. 



In through that door have entered youth and maid; 
Before that altar have their vows been said; 
Upon her finger priest has placed the ring; 
Gone all ; these rivers now their dirges sing. 

To-day another j'outh, now standing there, 
Another maid to marriage-bed would bear; 
Another priest another ring will give ; 
And streams repine when these have ceased to live. 



Thus moralizing, Arthur turned away 
From where his memories will oft return; 
From where began the shadows of that day 
Whose flame within his soul will ever burn. 



THE BETROTHAL. 



THE BETROTHAL. 

From " Katrine and Arthur." 

BESIDE them lay broad fields which gently fell 
From either hand t' embrace a purling brook 
That slow meandered, welcome, in their midst; 
And, at their furthest limit, rose abrupt 
(As one vast wave swells on a steep-sloped shore) 
Until they touched the border of the woods 
Which covered head and shoulders of a hill; 
The woods, dark-green, inviting to their shade; 
The fields of grass late mown and now sweet-scented; 
The fields of wheat and oats full ripe and yellow 
Bowing their heads to their approaching fate. 
"This is our farm," Katrine remarked, "where often 
We go to frolic near the farm-house yonder 
Between the hills, or ramble in the woods, 
Or build a fire and roast the toothsome sweet-corn. 
Or dance and sing and play on our guitars." 

Beyond they wound between high hills, wood-crowned, 

And crossed a valley and again ascended 

A hill by winding roads between wild hedges 

Of shrubs and briers which half hid the fences. 

The daisies^ gathered thick beside the way, 



Erect but modest, raised their full, frank eyes 

To look upon the loving pair now passing. 

The little birds alighted in the bushes 

And peeped between the leaves to see the lovers. 

And sweetly chirruped to them their good wishes; 

And even the four-footed brutes, who lowly 

Incline their heads to eat from humble table 

Their frugal fare, ceased grazing and looked up 

And winked their big, soft eyes in mute approval. 

All nature seemed in sympathy with them. 

The winds were gentle and but lightly touched 

Their faces and but coyly stirred the halo 

Of yellow hair about her brow and temples. 

Even the careless clouds above moved slowly 

That they might linger on the scene of love. 

And here they stopped, observing through a notch 

Betwixt the hills a hazy, dreamy picture 

Of towers and buildings backed by distant mountains. 

A veil of purple air, spread over all. 

Gave to the scene the semblance of a vision 

Of some strange, far-off and unreal world. 

Then in their hearts these two beheld strange cities. 

With towers of strength and walls of gi-ace and beauty, 

All covered with the purple haze of glory 

That hope e'er throws about her forms enchanting; 

And backed by mountains ever green, impassive. 

The powerful, shelt'ring arms of the Almighty. 

In those strange cities they in fancy dwelt 

In homes of sweet content, with peace all furnished. 



Adorned with trophies of the world's success, 

Lighted and warmed alone by ardent Love, 

Which was the setless sun of those fair cities 

Where never dusk nor gloom of night succeeded. 

They silent gazed upon the double scene 

Till Arthur gently bade the horses on; 

And for a time their speech was soft and low. 

As if they would disturb by louder tones 

The sweet vibrations of their inmost souls. 

As slow the horses further climbed the hill 

(For they seemed now to understand the wish 

Of them they bore) the lovers sudden turned, 

An instant looked into each other's eyes. 

And read there tales their words could ne'er express. 

Down in that well of azure Arthur peered 

So far beyond the beauteous circling brim 

That opened wide and let him freely see 

The pure, clear fountain deep as thought could pierce 

(The depths unsullied of the maiden's soul). 

So pure and clear — itself a radiant source 

Of light that oft had welled up to the brim 

And flashed its beauty to another eye, 

But never had the fount itself been seen; 

And never more shall those blue brims dilate 

And show to Arthur's gaze the crystal waters 

In which he then beheld himself reflected. 

Henceforth sweet Memory alone may show 

The wondrous vision he that moment saw. 

The soul is not laid bare by one's volition; 



It does not answer to another's summons, 

Or stern command, or soft and sweet petition; 

But if it ever show its naked self 

Unto another it is when, unconscious, 

Raj)t in sweet contemplation, unawares 

It opes the door that it may better see, 

And finds, surprised, an eager, watchful eye; 

Then quickly shuts nor henceforth opes the door. 



On, circling, slow ascending, still they passed. 

The sweet thoughts crowding thicker in their hearts 

That even now seemed bursting with the flood 

They could not hold, nor would prevent from coming. 

Nor scarce could Arthur now restrain his arms 

From clasping to his heart the maid bewitching 

Who sat beside him. On her happy head 

A broad-brimmed hat, trimmed with a bunch of roses 

And roll of soft, blue mull. A white, thin garment 

But slight obscured the sky-blue dress beneath, 

Save on her arms, where through its thin disguise 

Appeared the faint pink glow of nature's tinting. 

Her small, white hands played with some flowers which Arthur 

Had gathered by the way; and oftentimes 

She raised the half-hid face up to his view. 

Set in a golden haze of flowing hair 

And tinted on its cheeks to match the roses 

Upon her hat; and from her azure eyes 

Threw glances innocent and frank and merry, 



But fraught with tenderest love, full in his own; 

And parted in sweet smile the bright-red lips, 

A smile that ran across her glowing cheeks 

And sought to hide itself within her dimples. 

Still on by fields all overgrown with shrubs, 

By fields of corn, by fields of yellow grain 

Now falling fast before the noisy reaper 

Loud clattering in the ears of trembling stalks 

The warning of their swift-approaching doom. 

At last they enter through the high-arched gateway 

And, skirting round the vaults of human husks 

Now empty and returning dust to dust, 

They come upon a charming woodland way. 

Which they pursue around the mountain's brow. 

Upon one side the woods slope to its summit 

And on the other fall down to the stream 

That flows about its base. Half round the mountain 

The leafy -shaded way abruptly ends; 

But ere that point is reached a hillock rises 

Upon the mountain's side, wood-covered, steep; 

And there the road expands into a circle, 

Within whose center stands a lone pine tree. 

Here Arthur stopped, and to the inviting tree 

Made fast the equine pair and left the two 

To ruminate beneath its grateful shade; 

Then with Katrine he climbed the little hill. 

Upon its brow she sat, where, looking down 

Between the trees, the flowing stream appeared 

And glimpses of the farms upon its shore. 



And to their ears rose sounds of husbandry, 
A farmer's rude dictating to his oxen, 
A mother's shrill, sharp calling to her offspring, 
And shouts of children playing on the bank; 
And in between these sounds a sweet refrain, 
The stream's soft argument with some strong rocks 
That stubbornly intruded them upon it. 
And Arthur, glad reclining at her feet. 
Looked up into her face and was content. 
And would have welcomed the Almighty's sentence, 
"Thus shall it ever be with thee and her!" 
But the pulsations of his heart assured him 
That time was speeding and the sweet hour passing 
In which he might remain there with Katrine. 
And now his words are plain, for he would know 
In words as plain her answer to his love. 
He tells her of his life, his present prospects. 
His future hopes, nor pictures half so fair 
As to his sanguine mind appears that future. 
He bids her think upon her present life 
Of peace and plenty, love and luxury. 
And of the prospects fair and promises 
Of her own future — not regarding him — 
For high above his present selfish hopes. 
His pleasing dreams of happiness with her. 
His wish supreme is that her life shall be 
Supremely happy, or with him or no. 
Then answered she in words as frank as his 
And told him that her life was fair and happy, 
70 



That she was loved and had sweet friends about her, 

That she had ample of the world's possessions; 

But that since she had known him, in her thoughts 

Her future happiness with him was linked, 

Though but in hope till now; but now so strong. 

Nor loving friends, nor home, nor luxury. 

Nor aught should e'er divert her love from him, 

Nor in her contemplation separate 

Her longed-for future happiness and him. 

Then Arthur drew him close beside Katrine, 

Encircled in his arms her sky-blue waist 

And kissed her pretty neck and rosy cheek. 

And whispered in her ear such tender words 

As to the curious, listening birds about him 

He would deny; but from their prying eyes 

He could not hide, nor from the gaze of squirrel 

High perched upon a bough, his bushy tail 

Bent forward on his back, now barking at them. 



Thus on the hillock bound these two their hearts 
In sweet betrothal, while the birds looked on, 
And from his perch the squirrel gazed and scolded. 
And from the farms, far down the mountain, rose 
The shouts of children and the swain's rude tones. 
And from the stream its murmurs of reproach 
Against the rocks, while back of them the horses 
Stood patiently and waited for their coming. 
Beside the pine tree in its grateful shade; 
71 



While Arthur, lowly stretched beside Katrine, 
Held her blue waist and kissed her neck and cheek, 
While she plucked from a little neighboring bush 
Its tender leaves and tore them into shreds, 
While all the trees around them stood in silence, 
And over them the careless clouds moved slowly, 
And softly on their faces blew the south-wind. 



LOFE SONGS. 



A LOVER'S FAREWELL. 

Farewell, sweet Friend! 
The few, short days of joy are gone 

Which thou hast lately granted me; 
And I, unhappy, left alone 

With only memories of thee. 

Farewell, sweet Love! 
In all the dreary hours until 

I shall behold thy face again. 
Thine eyes, thy breath, thv kisses still 

Will haunt my heart and soothe its pain. 

Farewell, my sweet, sweet Heart, farewell! 
Oh! hateful word that breaks the spell 
Of lips that touch, of hearts that love, 
Of arms entwined — Oh! strength of Jove, 
Destroy that fateful word and seal 
Our lives in one eternal weal! 

And yet — I bid thee — Sweet — farewell! 

Seplemhei- ig, /SSj. 



"MY LOVE HAD GONE. 

I went into the cheerful home 
Where erst my Love did dwell. 

I thought to hear her footstep come 
Or merry voice her presence tell; 

But all was silent. Then there fell 
Upon my heart a heavy cloud ; 

My Love had gone! I knew it well. 
My soul within me cried aloud. 

why must I from her be kept 
Whose love and lips are all my joy? 

If she but on my bosom slept 

No earthly care would e'er anno)'. 

Then come again, my loving Heart! 

Ami do not from me ever stray. 
Let not your lips from mine depart; 

My arms shall still about you stay. 
* « « * 

1 go into the dreary home 
Where erst my Love did dwell; 

I do not hear her footstep come, 
Nor merry voice her presence tell. 
September 21, iSSj. 



THE SOUTH -WIND, SOFT." 



The south-wiiul, soft, from o'er the sea 
Is not so fresh and pure a draught 

As thy sweet breath, that came to me 
When, Love, at thy dear lips I quaffed. 

The south-wind, soft, so gently plays 
Upon my cheeks and temples now ; 

It minds me, darling, of the days 

When thy soft fingers touched my brow. 

But sweetest thought of all it brings — 
Seen only by the slender moon, 

Thy lips kissed mine (the memory clings); 
O softest touch — but gone so soon. 

Now dream I on of later grace, 

Of other joy (most precious boon!) 
Lips, hearts and all in warm embrace, 

Not even seen by slender moon. 
* * * * 

The golden orb, thin veiled by cloud. 

Is hanging in the western sky ; 
A light as bright and ardent glowed 

Upon my soul in days gone by. 
77 



My Light is hid, ;iiid through Love's night 
I'm lonel}' waiting till she rise; 

Her who alone is my delight 

I'm watching for in eastern skies. 



The south-wind, soft, from o'er the sea 
Falls gently, sweetly on me now 

While I am waiting. Love, for thee 
And thy soft hand to press my brow. 

September 2y, iSSj. 



THE CLOUD AND FIELD. 

Virginia! with the love-lit eyes 

That look so sweetly into mine, 
From which the dart of Cupid flies 

Directly back again to thine. 

Thus, darling, we each other wound 
And one to other gives sweet pain; 

More sweet and welcome than to ground 
Are softest strokes of gentle rain. 

I am a field, a cloud thou art, 

(I would that Field and Cloud were nearer!) 
While dear thy rain falls on my heart. 

Thy own soft pressure would be dearer. 

If but I were a mountain now. 

Then thou wouldst come, embrace my form. 
Soft stroke my face, sweet kiss my brow. 

And shower Love's darts in gentle storm. 

O, dearest, would it not be sweet 
If we could thus each other greet.' 

A field cannot to mountain grow. 

But swift-winged cloud its love may show. 



Just think, \'irginia, if you will, 
A mountain 's but a greater hill, 

A hill is only larger mound. 

Anil fields have mounds set all around. 



Could not you then, Virginia, dear, 
Come to the Field its heart to cheer? 

Come! as a dew — a fog — but come! 
And make my mouth with kisses dumb! 

Now Cloud may on these love-lines fall 
When I have writ myself 

Thy 

Paul. 

Christmas Evt, tSSj. 



"FOR VIRGINIAS SAKE." 

The sun was setting, and the evening star 
Peeped drowsily upon the hills and lake; 

We looked together on the scene afar — 
I loved it most for my Virginia's sake. 

Fast paled the golden light along the west, 
As fast we saw a thousand stars awake; 

Dark grew the hills, the wee bird sought its nest- 
I loved the gloaming for Virginia's sake-. 

We wandered on; too fast, the hill, descended; 

Too soon the lamp-light on our sight did break, 
And, too, too soon had our sweet journey ended — 

I was most sorry for Virginia's sake. 



My sun has set; my hills and dales in gloom 

Are wrapped; my birds are sleeping, ne'er to wake; 

My gloaming but some kindly stars illume — 
Ah! — night! — I'm sorry — for Virginia's sake. 



I WONDER IF SHE KNOWS." 



I wonder if she knows 

How oft my thoughts have tiirued 
(As Moslem, while he praj's, 
Toward Mecca bends his gaze) 
Toward her, while my soul yearned 
For one sweet look that in her dear eyes glows- 
I wonder if she knows. 



I wonder if she knows 

How long the moments seem 
Since yestermorn she left 
My soul so sore bereft 
(As, waking from a dream 
Of bliss, the heart but sad and sadder grows)- 
I wonder if she knows. 

I wonder if she knows 

How sweet the roses smell 
On which, so far away. 
She looked but yesterday 
And o'er them breathed a spell 
Tliat to my restless soul brings sweet repose — 
I wonder if she knows. 



I wonder if she knows 

How glad my heart will he 
When in my arms once more 
I fold her as of yore 
And in her dear eyes see 
The love that to me like a clear brook flows- 
I hope — I think she knows! 



AN OCTOBER IDYL 



* * [ would thou hadst not left me! 
Although I do not know thy naine, 
Nor e'er before had seen thy face, 
I miss thy sweetness and thy grace, 
I miss thy love-look — all the same 
As if of friend fate had bereft me. 



Art thou not thinking, too, of him 
To whom thou waved a last adieu 
Ere from the pier thou turned away 
To stroll, on this October day. 
Through the bright woods, 'neath sky of blue. 
While squirrels spring from limb to limb? 



I sit beside thy empty chair 

And look back on the brilliant wood 
Where thou art treading on dead leaves 
While my lone spirit silent grieves. 
(That sullen plash bodes me no good; 
A haze is round me everywhere.) 



A white gull from the water springs 

And wings his rapid flight toward thee; 
More rapid flies my jealous love 
And wantons round thee in the grove, 
Peers at thee from behind a tree 
And in thine ear a love-song sings. 



I cannot think that thou dost feel 

The lonely pang that stabs my heart, 
And yet it would be sweet to know 
That thou dost love me even so 
And didst regret that we should part 
Ere that we might our love reveal. 



If it shall be that once again 

We on this lake together ride, 

I'll sing to thee a little lay 

About a sweet October dsiy. 

While I am sitting by thy side — 

And thou wilt know me better then. 

*^ Hiawatha^^^ Chautauqua Lake, 
October 21, 1886. 



'IS IT STRANGE THAT 1 SHOULD LOVE YOU?" 

Is it strange that 1 should love you? 

All these many days, 

By your gentle ways, 
In my web of thought you have been weaving 

Silken threads of softness rare and beauty 

(While my fingers trembled in their duty), 
Which my fancy formed in pictures past believing. 

Is it strange that I should love you? 

With your tender eyes, 

Whence Love's arrow flies, 
Mine with softest strokes you have been pelting; 

And when once from yours there rushed a river 

Quick I felt my frame responsive quiver 
As my soul in sympathy your tears were melting. 

Is it strange that I should love you? 

When your sweet voice spoke 

In my heart awoke 
Chords that only Love's dear tones vibrate; 

My rapt soul their dulcet music noting. 

Seemed on amorous, airy wavelets floating. 
Can you blame me that I welcomed such a fate? 



Is it wrong that I should love you? 

True, you are not mine, 

Nor can I be thine, 
Yet I cannot think it really sin 

That, unhid, my soul to yours went speeding. 

Drawn by that which satisfies its needing; 
If 'twas sin I'll never wish it had not been. 



TO VIRGINIA. 



Virginia! with the merry laugh, 
Whose echoes in my memory live; 

And lips at which I fain would quaff, 
As erst, the sweets they only give. 



Virginia! with the golden tresses 

That fall, luxuriant, on her shoulders; 

And arms that give such dear caresses, 

And eyes in which Love's hot fire smoulder 



I would to-night those sweet eyes see; 

Those dear arms feel and stroke those tresses; 
And hear thy laugh ring merrily. 

And on my own feel thy lips' presses! 

December ji ^ iSSj. 



MISCELLANEO US. 



TO MY FATHER, 

On the Completion of His Ninetieth Year. 



Dear Father! Thou hast lived a score 
Beyond the three score years and ten 
Which round the little lives of men 

Whose strength is but the common store. 

And even yet thine eye is brio-ht, 
Thine ear alert, thy taste acute, 
And all thy senses such as suit 

At three score, and thy step as light. 

And so to-day I fain would sing 
Of thy long life in grateful praise 
To Him who giveth length of days, 

And strength, and health, and each good thir 

And I would scan thy long life o'er 
As, standing by an ancient tree, 
I seem through all the years to see 

While it has grown from more to more. 

I see the spot beneath the hill 
Where, ninety years ago to-day. 
The little, new-born man-child lay, 

Whose voice, begun then, echoes still. 



The house is gone, and, in its place, 

A newer home new hearts contains; 

There newer mother bears her pains 
And smiles upon her infant's face. 

I see the old log-house, where thou 

Didst, restless, con thy lessons o'er; 

And swung thy feet above the floor, 
While all thy thoughts were of the Now. 

And that long, rocky slope appears 

Athwart which thou hurled stones at night 
And woke those trains of flashes bright 

Whose gleams have pierced through all these years. 

And, too, that later school-room, when 
Thy harder tasks were patient wrought; 
I ween more patient since thou got 

A glance from Rachel now and then. 

And still another room I see 

Where thou, as master, held the rule, 
Kind master of the village school 

And master of the rule of three. 

Yon fields, once wild^ thy hands subdued; 
There, streams where oft the speckled trout 
Thy hook ensnared; those woods about, 

Where thou the dappled deer pursued. 

92 



The weather-beaten house still stands 

Where thou thy first love wooec} apd wed. 
The nuptial blessings scarce were said 

When Death upon her )aid his hands. 

The grave is old where she was laid, 
The stone is worn that bears her name, 
But in thy heart is still the same 

Fresh image of the winsome maid. 

Two other graves, one overgrown 
These forty years, and one yet bare, 
Thy later joys and griefs declare — 

Thrice mated and thrice left alone. 

I see thee as I first recall 

Thy features, when my childish dream, 
Asleep or waking, made it seem 

That God was like thee all in all. 

Thy life has ever quiet been; 

Content to labor with thy might 

And chiefly careful to be right. 
Unselfish, just and pure within. 

I cannot sing thy wealth or fame. 

Of place or power which thou hast held; 
But in this couplet I would weld 

Truth, faith and goodness to thy name. 



And when thou hast lain down to rest 
Not less shall be men's comments than 
" There lies in all respects a tnan^ 

Whom they loved most who knew him best. 

One parting prayer my Muse would say: 
God grant that many autumns more 
Thy feet shall tread the hither shore 

Ere from our sight thou wend thy way. 

October ig, iSSS. 



"UNMANLY DEVOTION."* 

Unmanly to forgive! If you had said 

Unwomanly I might have held my peace; 

For when her sister has been seen to fall 

From virtue's beauteous and exalted paths 

Down to the meaner, rougher ways of life, 

On which so many trudge with aching hearts 

And shame-hid faces, weary of the world 

Of sin and sorrow which they there behold, 

How seldom from the upper, purer paths 

Is reached a woman's hand to help her back. 

To lift her from the ways that ever downward 

Pursue their evil course to end in hell! 

Unmanly so to love his wife, the mother 

Of his sweet babe! that, when she did forget 

Her vows of constancy and his devotion 

And left her faithful spouse and tender child, 

Lured by the blandishments of wealth and pleasure. 

And found a goal of poverty, remorse 

And lonely sickness, leading her to death. 

He still kept in his heart sweet thoughts of her 

And, when he learned that she was dying, hastened 

To kiss the dew of death from off her forehead 

♦President Cleveland's sister used 
while endeavoring to dissuade Mrs. Jam 



And lay her weary head upon his breast 
And whisper in her ear his dear forgiveness. 

Unwomanly perhaps! and, if unmanly, 

The more the shame! I'lay, is it base, ignoble, 

In man or woman, to be like that One 

Who kindly chid, "Go, woman, sin no more," 

Who deemed it not pollution that the sinner 

Washed with her tears His feet and on Him poured 

The precious ointment, her best offering; 

Or dost thou think it truly noble, manly., 

To loathe the sinner equal with the sin? 

O Pharisaic woman, who would have 
A heaven but for such as thou alone! 
Go, hide thy frigid, barren breast, on which 
No manly man may look save with reproach! 
Nor seek to drown thy sister's voice that tells 
A tale of love, a story of forgiveness. 
Of one poor, humble man who loved his wife 
As God loves sinners; and who pardoned her 
As some day 30U will wish to be forgiven! 
April s, fSS6. 



THANKSGIVING. 

A nation sits to-daj' in thankful frame 

Round tables laden with the harvest's yield; 

A nation pays its homage to His name 

Whose loving care brought fruitage to the field. 



Upon the fresh-turned earth men scattered seeds, 
Which lay through barren winter 'neath the snow. 

Thus sown in simple faith, the worthiest deeds 
Oft long lie buried ere they fruitful grow. 

The vernal showers, the vernal sunshine came. 
The seeds sprang into stalks upon the mold; 

And summer's fertile rains and ardent flame 

Filled the stalks' heads and turned their green to gold. 

So grew men's loving thoughts, men's virtuous deeds, 
When on them fell the gracious smile of God; 

Love bore a crop of love for all men's needs. 
Virtues lie thick and green .is autumn's sod. 

Yet, midst the worthy wheat grew some wild tares; 
Midst virtues, vices; and with good, some ill; 



Sorrows with joys — God answered not all prayers; 
But he is good, and men are thankful still. 



Garners are pregnant with the ripened grain; 

Peace walks with Plenty, Love looks from each face ; 
And grateful hearts within the sacred fane 

Praise the good Giver of this ample grace. 

And each man, happy, in his home sits down 
To eat and drink his well-provided cheer; 

And in his heart content and comfort crown 
The thousand blessings of the fruitful year. 

November, iSS6. 



TO A YOUNG LADY, 

After Visiting Her Sick Pet Dog. 

I am anxious to quiet the fears of your heart, 
Which, I fancy, is still, as it was, all agog; 

And yet I must say, to be frank on my part, 
I found our poor patient " as sick as a dog." 

However, as singular as it may seem, 

I was met by a growl, e'en before I addressed him; 
Which gave me of hope, not a ray, but a bca7n 

That curable was the disease that distressed him: 

For patients who growl are the kind that affirm. 
When the gods have invited them into their mill 

To be ground very fine, and all that (if the term 

You will pardon), that they'll "be doggoned if they will.' 

And so I am ready to-night to opine 

(Though of course it is true we are all in the dark) 
That, by aid of the spirit and beef and quinine, 

We will quickly determine the virtue of bark. 

Now, if you should observe that the dog wags his tail 
You will know that his sickness won't last very long. 

On the contrary, if the reverse should prevail 

'T would imply that the former was not very strong. 



Thus briefly discussing the symptomatology, 
Prognosis and treatment of poor little Max, 

It remains that I sing, as it were, his dogs(x)oIogy 
In terraque salus, in coeloque pax! 
January lo, iS86. 



A FLIRTATION. 

One beautiful day, by the murmuring sea, 

Sat a youth all alone, all alone was he; 

And he listlessly peered 'neath the brim of his hat 

At a pair of brown eyes and a face, and all that. 

And the eyes peered at him and the face softly smiled, 
Till his heart by the glances and smiles was beguiled 
From its lonely, contemplative, regular action 
To a thumping desire to approach the attraction. 

And the heart of the maiden beat faster and stronger 
As glances repeated and shadows grew longer, 
Until mutual impulse brought both to their feet 
And impelled them to seek a convenient retreat. 

Where, free from suspicion and rude observation, 
Two strangers might join in a wished conversation ; 
And so this fair maid and the youth with the hat 
Indulged a brief hour in agreeable chat. 

They talked about this and they talked about that, 
They gazed at the bathers, some lean and some fat, 
And they looked at each other and thought vastly more 
Than they spoke while they sat there upon the sea's shore. 



And the waves ebbed and flowed, and the moments too soon 
Took their leave, without license, that sweet afternoon; 
And to-night there remains, to distinguish that day, 
Only memories — and a dear, little blue spray. 
February 12, 1886. 



IDEAL AND REAL. 



O tell me not that I shall find, 
In pleasing image of the mind, 
More joy than I shall ever see 
In all the sweet reality! 

'Tis very sweet to think, I trow. 
Of that supreme, ecstatic bliss. 
But I will aye prefer to know 
The real, spicy, soft, sweet kiss! 



MY FLOWERS ARE FADING." 



My flowers are fading, and their fragrance sweet 
Is changing to a rank and noisome smell; 
So mortal beauty fades, Time's baleful spell 

Brings, soon or late, all fair beneath our feet. 

My flowers are dead. So must all mortal die; 
And, grown offensive, foul, be cast away. 
Ye beautiful and fair! Be proud to-day; 
With my dead flowers to-morrow ye may lie! 



TO A FERN, 

Plucked on the Summit of Mount Raven. 



Thou little Fern! On yon high mountain's top, 

Most wondrously curled in a little ball, 

Thou lay concealed beneath the ling'ring snow 

Until the vernal Sun crept in thy bed 

And woke thee with his hot and lusty stare; 

And smiled to see thee drowsily stretch out 

Thy tiny form; and came again next day 

And kissed thee, whisp'ring ardent hopes of days 

To come when he and thou would revel there 

With summer breezes and soft, fleecy clouds 

That oft would stop a moment on their way 

To toy with thee and thy aspiring mates. 

Then, with his occult art, he deftly brewed, 

From the clouds' kisses and the morning dew, 

The rocks and the rough mold to which thou clung. 

A dainty liquor, which thou gladly drank 

And wast refreshed thereby, and daily strengthened 

To meet the rude assaults of pelting rains 

And careless, violent winds and raging tempests 

And chill, depressing gloom of moonless nights. 

Henceforth from day to day thy courage grew, 

And strength, but not thy form, for thou art like 

Thy ancestors, in stature small, yet proud; 

105 



And more ambitious than thy grosser kindred, 

Who are content to live their little lives 

Secluded in some low, damp, shaded place 

Where e'en the universal friend of life, 

The Sun, may find no chance to smile upon them, 

Where they may see but their own selfish selves. 

The shrubs that hide them, and their dank earth-bed. 

But thou aspired to lofty pinnacle. 

The mountain's summit, whence thy vision swept 

O'er lake and stream and plain and lesser mountains 

Far as the human eye may scan the earth; 

Where, too, thou didst at night behold the stars. 

Their bright eyes blinking at thee as they moved 

Across the placid heaven ; and the moon 

E'er changing, whose white beams, so many nights, 

Made thy lone hours less lonely. In the morn 

Thou early didst awake to see the glorious 

Appearing of the sun; and watched, reluctant, 

Yet with delight, his marvelous disrobing. 

Upon the clouds he hangs his garments, dyed 

So rarely, many hued, which, donned at morn. 

Comprise his wondrous, brilliant robe of light; 

Then sinks to sleep upon the western sea. 



Yes, thou wee one! 'twas thy sublime ambition, 
Thy self-complacency where I felt fear, 
Thy courage and thy hardihood, thy love 
Of all the grand and beautiful and awful 

106 



Around thee — these it was so drew my heart 
To thee when with my two sweet maiden guides 
I stood beside thee on that mountain's top 
And, rapt, scanned all the wide horizon round. 
Therefore I plucked thee and, upon my heart, 
Bore thee away to my abode, where daily 
Thou mindest me of that rare hour we met. 
Ah, me! thy limbs are stiff with so long lying 
On my hard desk. — I fear much thou art dead! 
Well! well! we all must die — but where's thy spirit? 
It was thy spirit touched me on the mountain ; 
It is thy spirit that provokes these words. 
Has it gone back to hover o'er that summit 
Which it called home.^ To-night around my casements 
Mad winds are howling and the rain is pelting. 
On Raven's height more fierce the storm is raging; 
And in its midst thou sprite, I wis, art clinging 
To that great rock on which we stood together. 
A Dieu! brave little soul! I'll ne'er forget thee. 
Would all thy betters were as nobly fashioned! 
November lo, iSgt. 



" WERE THESE. MY DEAD, ALIVE." 

Were these, my dead, alive I would not now 
Be lying, lonely, sad and broken-hearted 
Upon this turf, where I so lately parted. 

With a last kiss upon each pallid brow, 

From the dear forms which, erst, in purest joy 
I pressed to my fond heart, while soft their arms 
Entwined about my neck and their sweet charms 

Obscured my woes, and cares ceased to annoy. 

Were these, my dead, alive I would not be. 

With mine, augmenting Heaven's tears now weepii 
Upon this city-full eternal sleeping — 

Tears that keep green their turf and memory. 

Were these, my dead, alive I would to-day 
(While Heaven weeps upon this quiet city, 
In loving sympathy and tender pity. 

Tears for the living and the lifeless clay) 

In some sweet home that I should call my own. 
Reclining on my couch, hold in each arm 
A prattling child, and with my kisses warm 

My daughter's first and then my boy's voice drown. 



Were these, my dead, alive, while there I lay 
With my two tender buds in close embrace, 
A beauteous flower would bend above my face 

And kiss my brow and with her children play. 

Were these, my dead, alive, each weary day 
Would have an evening hour of perfect joy; 
Each night, repose; sweet sleep without alloy; 

Each morn content would lead my duteous way. 

At Wildwood, in the rain. 
May 13, 1SS6. 



"WHEN DAYLIGHT DIES." 

When daylight dies 
And o'er the landscape deepening shadows glide, 
Yet not obscuring quite the meadows wide 
Nor the dark tortuous line where flows the stream, 
Lone, by my chamber window, do I dream 
When daylight dies. 

At eventide 
When the loud, boisterous day is hushed to sleep. 
When the slow-waking stars begin to peep 
Upon the drowsing world and murmuring deep, 
Above whom they will night-long vigil keep; 
While Canis shows his teeth, Ursa his tail, 
I muse serene and no rude thoughts assail 
At eventide. 

When darkness falls 
And through the wide-oped portals of my eyes 
Flit ghosts of landscapes, high around me rise 
The circling hills, like black clouds in the skies; 
Grander my thoughts, higher my spirit flies. 
Winging its airy way 'mong orbs by Thee 
Set in Night's vault to watch the world and me 
When darkness falls. 



In hallowed peace 
I close my eyes to all but thee, Most High! 
Within whose hand the wheeling planets fly 
As on the infant's palm the whirling toy 
A moment spins its round to give him joy. 
Before thy wondrous might my weakness falls. 
Thy love to thy great heart my spirit calls 
In hallowed peace. 

November, 1886. 



A PRAYER. 



God! almighty Source of power! 

We, thy feeble creatures, seek 
Strength for every weary hour 

Of the coming toilsome week. 

God! eternal Source of light! 

We are groping on our way, 
Shine upon our souls' dark night; 

Thou canst make it clear as dav! 



God! thou only truly Wise! 

We, who need so much to know. 
Wisdom more than gems would prize; 

Let us each dav wiser grow! 



God ! thou very Heart of love — 
Constant, tender, pure and sweet! 

Grant this prayer, all else above: 

With our hearts, in such love, meet! 



SKETCHES. 



MY NATIVE HAMLET. 



IN a contemplative mood I wandered, to-day, about the 
village in which my earliest years were passed. In the 
faces of those whom I met in my walk I discovered only 
the cold stare or half-interested, questioning gaze which 
villagers give to a stranger. I found upon my way no 
welcome smile, nor even recognition ; and yet, in that little, 
brownish-yellow house, a few feet back from the narrow 
sidewalk, I began (in a small way, truly, but with no incon- 
siderable eclat) my mundane and vociferously independent 
existence. 

As a puling, expressionless infant, with no very pleasing 
personal appearance, too freshly rubicund and too loudly 
discontented with my suddenly-acquired condition, aimlessly 
knocking my soft head with my wee and harmless digits, 
utterly indifferent to the courtesies of callers, not even deign- 
ing a responsive glance to their oculary salutations; a 
tiny and total stranger, not only to that community, but to 
the world; offending, every moment, against the commonest 
rules which regulate the institutions of society; as heathen- 
ish, indeed, in my conduct as though my parents had leaped 
from tree-top to tree-top in an African jungle, with a score 
of yet more disagreeable idiosyncrasies of my natal state, 
my advent to that village (I am credibly informed) was, 
notwithstanding, so phenomenal and so important an occasion 
that no less distinguished a personage than the principal 
115 



physician in those parts, the genial and worthy Doctor M., 
lent his presence, and, with a condescension and famiharity 
which were unmerited by my brief acquaintance with him, 
gave me a hearty slap of welcome, upon a region, luckily, 
in which my tender, vital forces did not lie. Moreover, the 
accomplished wife of the clergyman, the kind Mrs. W., did 
me the honor to volunteer her efficient services in introduc- 
ing me to some novel methods which she deemed it expedi- 
ent that I should then pursue. The news of my coming to 
town spread through the hamlet, and many, both old and 
young, hastened to pay their respects to me and to con- 
gratulate my parents upon the accession of so estimable an 
individual to their household. The matrons and maids 
bestowed their sweetest osculations, and the men and boys 
offered as much of their respective hands as they supposed 
would be acceptable to the strange Lilliputian or appreciated 
by his limited capabilities. In this flattering manner I was 
received, at a period when to give aught in return I had 
neither ability nor inclination. 

Behold, now, the dull discernment of rural minds, and 
mark the irrational discrimination of their energetic urbanity! 
I came among them again to-day, a stranger, as before, but 
in many respects strikingly altered, and, I trust, to ad- 
vantage. In my stature there is no suggestion of the 
diminutive, unless, forsooth, it be in contrast. My manner 
is now quiet, and neither selfish nor savage. My complexion 
has improved, and the capillary covering of my cranium has 
concealed the barren suggestiveness of the former occasion. 
My hand will now receive, with appreciation, the proffered 
palm of boy or man; and, should the eyes of matron or maid 
now throw upon mine their soft strokes of affectionate greet- 
116 



ing, I will not persist in casting my glances divergent to 
those attracting orbs, nor will I, as was my wont when I 
first appeared in this hamlet, stuff my fists in my mouth to 
oppose the luscious imprint of a labial salute; and yet, 
strange to say, I have come from retracing my native paths 
without having received so much as a nod. " Tempora et 
mores mutajitjii- et nos mutamuy in tilts"! But the muta- 
tions of time have not so sadly affected the impersonal 
associations of my infancy. There, before the door-way, 
one on either side of the short walk from the gate to the 
portico, stand the two spruces which my father, more 
practical than sentimental, brought home, in a buggv, from 
his native state when he and my mother returned on their 
wedding journey. The trees have grown thrice as lofty as 
I, and their dark-green foliage drapes gracefully from their 
upward-curved limbs, as fringes and tassels hang softly 
pendant from the outstretched arms of a woman. And 
there, toward the west from the walk, is the apple-tree (not 
changed so much as the spruces), which was so beautiful in 
the spring-time and gave such sweet scents to my nostrils, 
and all through the summer shaded myself and my sister 
from the too ardent sunshine, and furnished strong arms that 
held up the never-tiresome swing, and, at last, in the autumn 
(before the leaves became yellow and rusty and fell to the 
ground, leaving its poor limbs bare through all the cold 
winter), offered to us the juicy and fragrant apples, each 
dangling from one of the tree's little fingers. Here, to the 
east from the house, but a few steps away, in the yard, near 
the fence, under a clump of lilacs and alders, is the limpid 
spring whose cool currents have flowed through all these 
years as constant as the warm streams from my heart. 
117 



Bending my little head over its crystal depths, I often gazed 
in childish wonder upon the boiling sand at the bottom, 
ceaselessly yielding to the welling water; and down there, 
too, I saw a face that opened its mouth and smiled and 
winked and twisted itself all awry whenever mine did the 
same. 

There, on the rear of the lot, alongside of the alley, is the 
stable which used to shelter the gentle bovine that I loved 
(not the less, I presume, because of the white and nutritious 
secretion which my father dextrously abstracted from the 
swinging magazine beneath her) and whom, one day, when 
her lacteal stock had diminished in worth below a fair interest 
on her flesh, my father killed and flayed and cut all in pieces, 
greatly to my amusement, until, when he had finished, I re- 
quested him to put her together again, when, learning that he 
could not comply with my wish and that I never should see 
dear old Buttercup again as I used to, I wept bitterly. 

Down the street, on the other side, stands the same sacred 
house in which, by the side of my mother or on the lap of 
my father, I played with my cap and kerchief while my 
little feet swung to and fro, but kept silence because I was 
told to, yet wished in my heart, with many a sigh, that the 
man would not tell such a long story. And back of the 
house is the church-yard, so quiet and dark with the shade of 
pines, where, when I was but a year old, in the arms of my 
mother, I looked on an open grave into which some men 
lowered the mortal remains of my grandmother, while I 
laughed aloud, in great glee, shocking the whole assemblage, 
but my poor mother most of all, for it was her dearest friend 
who lay there in the casket upon which the cold clods were 
to fall. 

118 



And up toward the other end of the hamlet, is the campus 
where (long before the cruel war called them to the ordeal 
of bullets and blood and death, or, still worse, starvation in 
rebel prisons) the militia gathered on training-days in the 
presence of the villagers and country-folk. The play- 
soldiers were proud of their martial display, when, in warlike 
attire, they executed manoeuvres and performed evolutions 
according to tactics; especially the officers and cavalrymen 
upon their mettlesome steeds, that were as much stirred by 
the music of fifes and drums as were the soldiers and people; 
and the spectators were proud of the feigned warriors, for 
there was no one among them but had some relation or 
friend in the company. Therefore those were always proud 
days, the proudest of the year, unless, perhaps, the Fourth of 
July, which was not, indeed, unlike them, for the soldiers 
took part, of course, in the festivities of that national day of 
rejoicing over our ancestors' prowess in arms, though then 
there were also happy bands of children, Sabbath-school 
organizations, in the prettiest dresses and ribbons, coats and 
caps which their more or less limited wardrobes permitted. 
On those occasions, too, my father was, usually, the orator 
of the day, being chosen because he was one of the most 
learned men in that neighborhood, and the most used of 
them all, save the clergyman, to literary effort, for he was 
then the village school-master, and exercised his honorable 
vocation in the old school-house which I saw to-day, a little 
further up the street. 

And there are the same village stores (those accom- 
modating depositories of all the various articles needful to 
the person, household, workshop, or farm), where, in the 
evenings or on idle afternoons, the men and lads loitered in 
119 



gossip or in the graver discussions of politics, law or religion; 
the thoughtful among them often giving to their ideas much 
more pleasing and practical forms than the diverted whittlers 
succeeded, meanwhile, in evolving by their swainish art 
from the pliant sticks. 

Then, too, over this broad highway, the turnpike, one 
of the principal thoroughfares from the metropolis to the 
Great Lakes, there daily rolled the cumbrous but comfortable, 
rocking stage-coach, which (before these days of palatial 
whirling across the continent in fewer hours than it then re- 
quired to transport the traveler from one end of the state to 
the other) was the most fleet and commodious common 
carrier. I imagine I see it now coming in sight at the top 
of the hill, to the east, in a halo of dust; and down it comes 
pell-mell, behind the galloping horses, bobbing and swaying 
to and fro in such violent motion I wonder the rough, reck- 
less driver retains his exalted position; but, with the most 
nonchalant air, he cracks his long lash over the team, and, 
while the villagers stop to stare and query about the oc- 
cupants, the four-in-hand dashes up to the inn, where the 
passengers alight to rest or partake of refreshment. There 
is the weary and somnolent gentleman who has held (as well 
as he could) his seat in the corner for half a thousand miles, 
and the courageous maiden who is returning from a pro- 
tracted visit to friends "east of the mountains"; the matron, 
way-billed from the last county, who is going to see 
Rebecca, her daughter, and make the acquaintance of somfe 
new representatives of the family, who will joyously greet 
their grandmother; besides, a mother with three or four 
children (the youngsters so happy they are really quiet with 
interest and expectation), who got on at C. and are billed 



• to F., where they will spend a fortnight with the "old 
folks," the mother's parents. Then the coach rolls across to 
the post-office, where the driver throws out from the boot 
the big mail-bag. There the always expectant group 
gathers to watch the assorting of letters and newspapers, and 
when it is over, some of the group turn away, as they have 
done every day for a month, empty-handed, and yet they 
will come to-morrow again, just the same. And now the 
big mail-bag is returned to the boot under the feet of the 
driver, and the coach has received at the inn its late oc- 
cupants and away down the street it is fast disappearing 
from the view of the villagers. 

Thus, as I strolled through the little hamlet which was 
once my home, the mute and inanimate relics that yet 
remain suggested a thousand dear recollections of friends 
and events that were borne out of sight in Time's chariot, 
as the travelers used to be carried away in the soft-cush- 
ioned, lumbering stage coach. 

Yes! my friends have departed, and those who once knew 
me are gone, or they have forgotten me, and I was, to-day, a 
stranger in the place of my birth. But many old landmarks 
are there just as they were thirty-five years ago; and by 
them I was welcomed and brought into sweet intercourse 
with the spirits of dead institutions and long-buried incidents 
of the years of my infancy. And, although the village seems 
dead, too, or very soundly asleep, for I saw none of that 
warm animation that ever appeared when I knew it long 
since; and, although it has wondrously shrunken in my 
estimation as a part of the world, for my world of to-day is 
so vastly greater than my world of that other day; and, 
although I shall never again have welcome of words in this 

121 



hamlet; even though all the rest of these present suggestions 
of the past shall also depart, yet I will sometimes come and 
awaken my earliest memories in lonely and sad, but sweet, 
contemplation as long as the spring under the little mound 
in the yard, near the roadside, shall continue to well, from 
the sand at the bottom, the cool, limpid water in which I so 
often beheld the reflection of the innocent face of a child. 
pebruary 26, 1886. 



"MY LIFE IS A STREAM." 



MY life is a stream, now narrowly flowing between very 
high and barren hills, that come sharply down to the 
water's edge, leaving no low, fertile spot which it 
might nourish, nor even a path by its side upon which men 
might walk. So, as they pass along, it is high upon the 
hillside, and they cast but distant glances toward the low 
water. An idle stream, bearing no burden of precious 
freight or more precious life, but navigable, and its yielding 
surface is awaiting the touch of some confident craft to 
awaken its unwilling indolence to agreeable action. A quiet 
stream; on so dead a level lazily lolling, it turns no wheel in 
all the whirling machinery of the world. The high hills 
shutting out the beauty beyond them, and even the light 
above them, make the stream dark and gloomy, and leave it 
alone to itself with only their bleakness. The stream can not 
peer further down the valley than the point it has reached, 
for a thick fog is there, which it touches but can not lift. 
Only one way can it look — backward, over the long, narrow 
length of itself, from the little beginning down, increasing 
so slowly in size and strength, but murmuring sweetly all 
through its youthtime; playing with pebbles, shaking the 
hand of a little bough bent over it and smiling as pretty 
a smile in the face of a pendant flower as it gives to the 
stream ; then laughing at the big stones placed in its bed by 
a youth for his maid to walk over upon; and roaring with 



glee as it dashes around a great rock that it finds in its way ; 
no obstacle but it can master. Now, in more dignified man- 
ner, and proud of the use made of it, the stream pushes 
against the breast of a wheel with its hands and a strength 
that rolls it around like a barrel; and the wheel turns the 
mill and the mill grinds the wheat into flour which the maid 
bakes in bread for the household. The stream is so happy 
to know that it labors for others and does some good that, ,, 
under the wheel, it bubbles and boils with delight. Still 
further on it carries the logs and the lumber and does the 
roughest of work that a stream may do. Later, the stream 
is entrusted to carry a beautiful craft on its bosom, and this 
is the greatest enjoyment that stream ever had, though it 
now does not tumble and toss and foam in its pleasure, but 
down in its bosom it feels the strong touch of her keel and 
spreads out its arms and embraces the vessel as much as it 
may. But once, in the night, a negligent pilot guided the 
pretty craft against a great rock ; and the shock made the 
stream tremble and lash the shores with its waves of dis- 
pleasure and grief, for the craft was broken to pieces. The 
stream, looking back now, sees only some parts of her fur- 
nishing lying along the shores, clinging to rocks and to roots 
that were glad to embrace a memento of that lovely craft. 
Then, as the stream flows on — for it could not stop — the 
shores become higher and higher, the low, verdurous banks 
and the trees disappear and, at last, the stream is encompassed 
as I described to you when I began. 

But while it is narrower, darker and hidden, it is deeper, 
and a sweet under-current of feeling, that has not on the 
surface an index, is quietly flowing on into the future, under 
the fog. 



If, in the uncertain gloom, it shall fall into a cavern of 
earth and never again appear in the light of the sun nor take 
part in the bustle of life, it will dream of the light it has seen, 
and enjoy, in reflection, the pleasures of work it has done. 

Or, if it shall be that a little beyond these precipitous 
walls that enclose it, and which are so strong it cannot break 
through them, a little beyond the thick cloud that is now 
overhanging it, there shall appear a broad plain, whose grass 
it may nourish; or, stumbling over some obstacle, it shall 
alight on the wheel of a mill; or, if on its bosom someone, 
in temerity, places his vessel, heavily laden with woes, or 
with hopes, or with fortunes, the stream will be glad, and 
so work with a will at whatever its hands find to do. 



SENTIMENT. 



I REMEMBER you questioned me once as to what I en- 
joyed most, and when I replied, with some hesitation, 

"Sentiment!" you seemed disappointed. I meant by 
that word what I take its true meaning to be — a creation, 
resulting from a thoughtful, intelligent retrospection of a 
soul's deep experience — and this is my greatest, I may say 
my only thorough enjoyment. I enjoy my work when I 
have it to do; I enjoy the success of endeavor and endeavor 
itself, but sentiment most. I find it, of course, in poetry and 
the poetic expressions of prose. But, to me, it comes most 
sweetly fresh from the touch of an external hand on the 
chords of some sense. 

I inhale its perfume in the breath of a rose, in the sweet- 
scented violets and the dear apple-blossoms. 

I hear it in brooks and the voices of birds, in the sough- 
ing tree-tops, in the cadence of winds round the eaves and the 
sash, and in patter of rain on the roof. 

I see it in flowers and the faces of women, in the sunset, 
and up in the clear sky at night, in the woods and the fields 
and the sparkle of dew-drops. 

I feel it in the touch of a zephyr, in the tremor of earth 
when a train thunders by, in my trembling nerves that vibrate 
to touches of joy or of woe — for even the chamber of Death 
may give a sweet thrill to a thought. 



